Simulation, design, fabrication of novel AFM cantilevers for cell measurements

The change in oscillation frequency of a cantilever is proportional to the mass on top of the cantilever and to the amplitude of vibration. This causes a cross-sensitive between both effects and makes it difficult to have proper detection with a single cantilever beam. The goal of this project is to decouple both effects by engineering a mode shape to maintain as constant as possible the vibrational amplitude at the region of interest (typically the free edge of the cantilever). I perform this mode shape engineering by fabricating cantilever structures with a region where the stiffness is discontinuous in the cross section, over a portion of the length. The rest of the length is much stiffer and corresponds to the flat part within the engineered mode-shape. This project simplifies the use of cantilevers for mass measurements since it enables their use without the need of deconvoluting the effect of mass and position. The project has been patented under EPFL rights.